Bottoms up by all means

If globalisation is not delivering on its lofty promises, it is largely because it has been pursued from a purely economic, top-down perspective, without ever factoring a bottoms-up social and cultural dimension into the equation.

Yeah, right, Imtiaz. I’ll drink to that.

When I was nursing commas at FAO–Bangkok at the turn of the century, the ‘bottom-up approach’ was their catch phrase – it might still be, for all I know. The standard joke was that, given those eminent paper churners’ daily practice thanks to tax-free booze, a ‘bottoms-up approach’ motto would have made more sense. Of course, there was also a smuttier version of the joke, but we won’t go into that.